Public Policy is social agreement written down as a universal guide for social action. We at The Policy ThinkShop share information so others can think and act in the best possible understanding of "The Public Interest."

Government by the people and for the people, just not paid for by the people? The American public continues its ambivalence towards governance and the dollars and cents that it costs, the civil liberty decisions and the intrusion into personal matters. Americans have come to see government as the root of many evils and seem to lack the political imagination to conceive of a way out or an alternative… The Pew Research Center puts out yet another timely study and overview of this important public opinion topic.

“As Barack Obama begins his second term in office, trust in federal government remains mired near a historic low and frustration with government remains high.

Explore public attitudes towards the federal government over time and compare the data with other key national indicators, such as …”

The London Economist provides some sober analysis on the Republican meltdown that represents the Presidential Election of 2012. The Republican disconnect between the young, women and Latinos could spell a new era of demographic consequences that are now clearly irreversible and that will mandate Republican philosophical change that may not be possible for another generation. Millionaire money, gerrymandering and voter suppression is clearly not enough to the blossoming diversity and generational succession that is now apparent in the “NEW AMERICAN ELECTORATE.”

“FOR conservatives casting about for comfort, there are plenty of plausible reasons to dismiss talk of a crisis. Mitt Romney could have run a better campaign. He reacted slowly when Barack Obama defined him as a heartless plutocrat, and flip-flopped on policies so frequently that even campaign allies struggled to keep …”

This Economist article is only one soul-searching conservative attempt to explain the current state of the Republican mind. It may take Conservatives, Tea Party stalwarts and Right Wingers another decade to figure it out. By then, the NEW AMERICAN ELECTORATE may have moved on. America is moving forward right past the right, its billionaires and its antiquated vision of “a real america”.

RONALD REAGAN appointed him to a federal judgeship. He served as acting attorney-general under George Bush junior. He has backed a law allowing investigators to interrogate terrorism suspects without informing them of their rights. As a federal attorney he prosecuted two prominent Democratic congressman; in private practice he represented large corporations. This is the CV not of a Republican judicial candidate, but of Eric Holder, Barack Obama’s attorney-general. Long unpopular with the right as well as the left, Mr Holder may well spend the coming year …

Eight states will ring in the New Year with a higher minimum wage, under state laws that require wage floors to keep apace with inflation. San Francisco, one of the few cities that sets its own minimum wage above the …

This was supposed to be the Tea Party’s time. The incumbent president the rebels despise so much seemed vulnerable. The Republican establishment was AWOL, leaderless or intimidated. So the angry, God-fearing, government-loathing populist …

Trailer by trailer, yard sale by yard sale, and pew by empty pew, a poor but tightknit immigrant community on Alabama’s breezy Gulf Coast is rapidly disintegrating.

This time it is not a tornado or hurricane uprooting families and scattering them to the winds. It is a new state law, largely upheld last week by a federal district judge, that seeks to drive illegal immigrants from …

California Governor Jerry Brown on Saturday finished signing the California Dream Act, under which California students who are undocumented immigrants will qualify for state-funded financial aid for college.

The controversial bill is the highest-profile act to expand undocumented students’ access to higher education after a federal Dream Act, which would have given undocumented students a path to short-term permanent residency status, failed last year to attract enough …

Despite an extended economic downturn, the public’s impression of whether the nation is economically divided remains relatively stable. While 45% say American society is divided between “haves” and “have-nots,” 52% say it is incorrect to think of the country this way. This is comparable to the balance of opinion a year ago.

The percentage of Americans who see society as divided between haves and have-nots declined shortly after Barack Obama took office, but has rebounded since. In April 2009, just 35% said the nation was divided economically, down from 44% in October 2008. The number saying the nation is economically divided increased to 42% a year later and has changed little since then (45% currently).

In seemingly endless times of “trash talk” that led to an improbable and unpopular political victory, the newly minted president clamors: “Now arrives the hour of action.” Fleeting relief comes to the nation as the transition […]

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